Monday, February 27, 2017

With a 1-0 victory over Middlesbrough this past weekend, with whom they are now tied in points, Crystal Palace was briefly out of the bottom 3 in the Premier League table (league standings), which is the dreaded relegation zone. After the win, Leicester City, last year's champions who are not the same as they were last year, were tied with them in points but below them in the tiebreaker scheme. Unfortunately, LC beat a fading Liverpool on Monday, and that dropped CP back into the bottom 3, though they are still tied with Middlesbrough on points.

So now LC faces Hull City, which CP needs them to beat to keep them in the bottom 3. CP next plays West Bromwich Albion, which is mid-table (8th). And Middlesbrough is up against Stoke City, also mid-table (10th). If everybody loses (Hull, Middlesbrough, and CP), then nothing will change at the bottom next week. It's a nervy time right now.

Last week, addressing CPAC, Steve Bannon said one of the goals of this administration was "the deconstruction of the administrative state". In the Washington Post, E.J. Dionne deconstructed what that phrase actually means:

"And Bannon actually made sense of Trump’s seemingly bizarre habit of naming people to head up agencies whose missions they
openly oppose.

...

"... the “deconstruction of the administrative state.” Bannon explained that officials who seem to hate what their
agencies do — one thinks especially of Scott Pruitt, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, who has
sued it repeatedly to the benefit of oil and gas companies — were “selected for a reason, and
that is deconstruction.”

Thus did Bannon invoke the trendy lefty term “deconstruct” as a synonym for “destroy.”

...

In practice, this is a war on a century’s worth of work to keep our air and water clean; our food, drugs and
workplaces safe; the rights of employees protected; and the marketplace fair and unrigged. It’s one thing to make
regulations more efficient and no more intrusive than necessary. It’s another to say that all the structures of
democratic government designed to protect our citizens from the abuses of concentrated private power should be
swept away."

So, simply, deconstruction means getting rid of the regulations that hold back business interests (another term for the wealthy, or the 1%) from exploiting natural resources, the environment, our money, and the less-privileged members of our population. It means getting rid of safety and safeguards, all in the name of business and "growing the economy".

The Republicans have returned to their roots: pollute, exploit, and profit. That's how they are. That's how they've always been, since Reagan.

Thursday, February 23, 2017

Despite my numerous admiring posts of Cheryl (formerly Cole, formerly Tweedy, formerly Fernandez-Versini, now just Cheryl), which can be searched for in this blog, I had only once commented on her unannounced pregnancy. She and young Liam Payne have kept her advancing pregnancy quite quite, and never officially announced it. But in this most recent appearance, announcing is unnecessary, as it is quite clear that in a short time-frame, she and Liam will be parents.

Kansas, Governor Sam Brownback's personal conservative experiment that is becoming increasingly untenable, took another step toward total failure. This step consisted of a coalition of Republicans and Democrats trying to force a bill with some actual common sense in it through the legislature. But it fell three votes short of a veto overturn -- Brownback vetoed it, of course, adding another brick to his monument to futility.

"The state is facing a $350 million budget shortfall. Brownback’s critics say the state’s persistent deficits are
evidence that the economic benefits from reduced taxes are not always adequate to make up for reductions in revenue,
as advocates of supply-side changes have sometimes claimed."

and this:

"That [tax] avoidance has contributed to repeated budget deficits, forcing state policymakers to take emergency measures,
exhausting the state’s reserves and diverting money dedicated to maintaining highways to keep the state’s
government operating."

Remember, states have to balance their budgets. Clearly this experiment is reaching a conclusive result.

It doesn't work.

Of course, this is what the Republicans in Congress are planning to get Donald Trump to do with the country.

Confusingly, there's a Presque Isle in Maine (nowhere near either the ocean or a large lake) and a Presque Isle State Park in Lake Erie, adjacent to Erie, Pennsylvania. Furthermore, the Presque Isle in Lake Erie is a peninsula, not an island. None of that makes a lot of sense. However, the Presque Isle (peninsula) in Lake Erie has a lighthouse, which is why it's featured here this week. To make Presque Isle matters even more complex, there is also a Presque Isle, Michigan, that has a lighthouse, too, which will be the lighthouse next week. It this Presque Isle is also not an island. What is up with that?

Thursday, February 16, 2017

I was hoping it wouldn't happen so fast, but the emboldened Congressional Republicans are planning to go after the Endangered Species Act -- one of the most important, if not THE most important, pieces of enviromental legislation ever passed. The powerful ESA could keep nearly-extinct species from being extinct, and preserve necessary habitat, and stop development in its tracks. Literally.

Hence, since it interferes with the march of the economy and environmental exploitation, Republicans hate it, even while a majority of Americans support it. (From Huffington Post: "A 2015 poll found that 90 percent of registered voters support the law. And late last year, another poll found that 70 percent of voters opposed eliminating protections “for some at-risk wildlife species such as the gray wolf or the greater sage grouse,” that would prevent them from being safeguarded by the ESA.") That level of support doesn't matter to the cool, cool conservative old geriatric dodderheads in Congress. They've hated the ESA for a long time, and they see this as their chance to rewrite it. Not do away with it, mind you -- that would be too obviously drastic -- but to gut its powers.

"Patrick Parenteau, an environmental law specialist at the University of Vermont Law School, said that rather than “modernizing” the Act, so far all he’s seen is “weakening” in the form of making it harder to list species, designate critical habitat, prevent habitat loss, and even base decisions on sound science.

He said Republican leaders have come out so strongly in favor of changing the ESA because “it gets in the way of development and activities that destroy habitat and frustrates narrow but politically powerful economic interests.”

The panel talking about "modernizing" (i.e., weakening) the ESA is now headed by John Barrasso, who has been a long-time enemy of it. He said this in his opening statement:

“States, counties, wildlife managers, home builders, construction companies, farmers, ranchers and other stakeholders are all making it clear that the Endangered Species Act is not working today.”

I wonder what he defines as not working? Well, let's look at what the reformers want to do, and then interpret. From Planet Experts:

"The reform agenda is focused on delisting endangered species and effectively removing restrictions on their habitats, capping the number of species listed, making it harder for citizens and civil society to file suits supporting conservation, and decentralizing decision authority so states and private entities– rather than the federal government – have rights over public lands."

So, to make the ESA "work", the Republicans would likely:

take species off the endangered species list, perhaps by changing the classification criteria;

allow economic activity in, on, or around endangered species habitats;

allow home building, construction, farming and ranching on land currently classified as endangered species habitat;

put a limit on how many species can be listed as endangered;

make it more difficult for lawsuits to either get a species listed for preserve/conserve habitat for endangered species; and

give the states and private owners control of land where endangered species live.

To make it simpler, the Republicans want to create a scenario where basically the Endangered Species Act doesn't protect endangered species.

We know that Eugenie Bouchard and Caroline Wozniacki are very pretty, athletic women. And we also know that between them, they haven't won a single Grand Slam tournament. On the other hand, Serena Williams has won more Grand Slam tournaments than any other woman in the Open era.

The one thing that they have in common is that they are all swimsuit models in the just-released Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. And they all look good in the swimsuits (from both sides). Caroline, sadly, doesn't reprise her painted-on suit like last year (see below) but still showed plenty of Caroline.

But still... now that they've shown their look in SI, they need to establish their athletic credentials by winning a Slam or two. It won't be easy (never is), but I like to see more champions in swimsuits. That's just me.

Wednesday, February 15, 2017

Cricketeer Joe Root has taken over the captainship (captaincy, captainhood, I don't know) of England's Test cricket team. The previous captain was Alastair Cook. Apparently they like last names with two o's in the middle.

The first Test series that will test the new captain is scheduled for April - July 2017, against the West Indies, hosted by England, and there will also be a World Test Championship in England in June.

So he's got a couple of months to get used to his new position. At least it's called "Captain" and not "silly mid-on" or something like that. Cricket has several weird names for positions in the field.

Tuesday, February 14, 2017

This wasn't a difficult find; I traveled mentally to the small southernmost main island of the Japanese archipelago, Kyushu, and looked for lighthouses. The one I found was the southernmost, and also notable because it has a symmetrical volcano nearby (Kaimondake, last erupted in 885 AD) that shows up in some of the pictures.

The short name of the lighthouse is Nagasakibana; the long name is Satsuma Nagasaki Hana. It isn't a very big lighthouse, and it's not one that is accessible from the inside. What it lacks in size it makes up for in a picturesque location, as you'll see.

Here's a short descriptive excerpt from The Lighthouse Directory:

"1957. Active; focal plane 21 m (69 ft); white light, 3 s on, 3 s off. 11 m (36 ft) round concrete tower attached to a square 1-story concrete equipment room. Entire lighthouse is white. The base of the lighthouse has been developed as a public observation deck, with a circular roof to provide shelter and a broad stairway leading down to the beach."

And the pictures I found. There are a lot of stock (professional) pictures available of this lighthouse too, but I don't feature those.

I read happily today that Playboy is going to stop its non-nude format, and return to that which made it famous -- lovely nude women.

It was a mistake, anyway. The Playmate is an American symbol, icon, ambassador, and representative of the best America has to offer. Without the Playmate, the Playboy Bunny is just another rabbit. A nude Playmate is special. A non-nude Playmate is just a pretty model.

And the thing about the Playmate that set her apart from other formats and venues was that usually she wasn't particularly famous or noteworthy before the centerfold appearance. (There have been a couple of exceptions, but Playboy was fairly famous for finding their girls young, so they had their careers ahead of them.) And of course, some Playmates went on to more conventional show business success, some did something entirely different, some married or partnered well, some got into various kinds of trouble, some just did the conventional route of getting married and having kids -- and some of them did ALL of that. Just like life -- even though Playmates set a rarely-equaled beauty standard that was not like normal life at all. Which made them special, desirable, and almost (but not quite) untouchable. Playmates were the girl-next-door who was also the captain of the cheerleading squad. Few of us could play in that league, but boys could dream. (And did, frequently.)

So this is happy news, at least for this loyal reader. Now, if they could just bring back pubic hair...

Bad financial news about Toshiba today, which owns Westinghouse, which was/is building the first new nuclear power plants in the United States in a long time (in Georgia).

Toshiba is writing down their investment to the tune of $6.3 billion dollars. That's a lot. Toshiba is potentially facing bankruptcy. And because Westinghouse has been the main builder of new plants other than Areva, and has plans with other countries, this affects those plans, too.

Monday, February 13, 2017

For a brief time a few days ago, Hawaii's Kilauea volcano created an amazing geological event.

You see, Kilauea has been pumping out lava for quite awhile, and one of these lava flows recently entered the ocean. Lots of fun things happen when lava meets the ocean; explosions, steam, acidic water vapor, shards of lava, Pele's Hair, and notably, the formation of cooled lava that builds up as the lava pours in can suddenly collapse and fall into the ocean waters, which is Not Safe (and people have died when it happened).

Well, it did happen, and fortunately this time nobody died. But after the fume cleared, there was a single massive flow of lava pouring powerfully into the ocean -- a "firehose flow". It was a remarkable and short-lived phase of an eruption that has been going on for decades. Well, that's what these kind of volcanoes do, they keep erupting fast-flowing basaltic lava. That's why the Hawaiian islands look like they do.

So, below is a link to the Daily Mail article about it, which has videos, too, and I borrowed a picture. I don't think the photographer was in a save place when he took these shots, but they are great.

At a pre-Grammy party, highly talented and highly lookable Nicole Scherzinger (dancer, singer, etc.) wore an outfit that was either somewhat transparent or translucent. And the lighting may have helped reveal what was underneath, which has happened to a few other women wearing black on top and nothing underneath.

In this case, it was clear that Nicole chose not to wear a brassiere. That was her choice, of course. The question is, did she know or did she not know what was visible? If she did know, then this is another case of breasts as fashion accessories, a previous subject of mine. If she didn't know, then we just get to contemplate the wardrobe malfunction, as the Daily Mail likes to refer to such incidents like this.

In a stunning demonstration of the power and resiliency of our new post-factual political culture,
Mr. Trump and his allies in the right media have already turned the term “fake news” against its
critics, essentially draining it of any meaning. During the campaign, actual “fake news” —
deliberate hoaxes — polluted political discourse and clogged social media timelines.

Some outlets opened the door, by helping spread conspiracy theories and indulging the paranoia
of the fever swamps. For years, the widely read Drudge Report has linked to the bizarre
conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who believes that both the attacks of Sept. 11 and the
Sandy Hook shootings were government-inspired “false flag” operations.

and ...

All administrations lie, but what we are seeing here is an attack on credibility itself.

The Russian dissident and chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov drew upon long familiarity with
that process when he tweeted: “The point of modern propaganda isn’t only to misinform or
push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth.”

This is true of a lot of things. Those of us that know the truth must protect and defend the truth.

the right of certitude
Within a simple night I found a placethat no one else would find, save me; I knewmy seat was there reserved and my embraceexpected, but the unknown factor tobe still determined there was time, the courseevents would take and aspirations make,although the basic bare essential forcecreated its accession. So the stakewas planted and the borders ascertainedand ev'ry boundary was cast asideas hope became a certainty ingrainedwith penetrating wonder and the prideof mingling fascination, whole and same,and while unseen 'twas worthy of acclaim.

Wednesday, February 8, 2017

Erta Ale, the shield volcano with a lava lake that is about as far from anything as anything can be in Africa, recently had a surge of activity. This surge meant that the normally quiet lava lake, down low in a crater inside the caldera, rose, and finally overflowed its crater, pushing lava flows onto the caldera floor. And then, the lake level dropped, the crater collapsed, and lava broke out from fissures on the side. That has happened before, but not recently.

Clearly it was a pandering lie when Donald Trump adopted the "repeal Obamacare" hypnotic chant that has mesmerized so many of the Republican voters. He never had a plan to replace it; no Republicans have a plan to replace it; and this truth is slowly becoming increasingly apparent.

And they'd better watch out, because the situation could get out of hand:

"What Republicans don’t seem to have come to terms with is that, as a political matter,
they already will be held responsible for whatever happens to health-care markets, even
if they don’t introduce a replacement soon. An executive order Trump signed relaxing
enforcement of Obamacare, and the constant talk of repeal, have injected a debilitating
uncertainty into the health-care market — essentially beginning the unraveling of
Obamacare with nothing to replace it."

While I don't want anyone to lose insurance, exposing this major lie by Trump and the Republicans would be flat-out great.

The skies over the Midwestern states of the United States lit up early on February 6 with an impressive fireball that headed toward Lake Michigan (not sure if it splashed down in the lake or not, though). It was big enough to cause sonic booms heard in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

This article from the Chicago Tribune indicates that size-wise, it might have been big enough to produce meteorites, which if it did, ended up in the lake. Several videos included.

The Biarritz lighthouse is in the deep southwest of France -- in fact, on clear days, you can see Spain from there. Plus, Biarritz has some great beaches. So it's well- and oft-photographed. It's a classic white tower, nothing fancy or unusual, but very prominent.

"The lighthouse of Biarritz stands on Saint Martin Point. It is a 44 m tower that was built between 1830 and 1834. From its upper deck (248 stairs to climb!), a wonderful 360° panorama opens to the visitors eyes and on a clear day even the i the Spanish city of Saint Sebastian can be seen on the horizon!"

Thursday, February 2, 2017

When the cameras were rolling and the Senators were asking questions, the new Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, smiled and said all the right things about climate change that he was supposed to, to reassure the Senators that he wasn't a lying weasel on this subject.

The problem is, as the former CEO of Exxon/Mobil, he's a lying weasel and his company has funded climate change denialism for years, and still can't get over the habit.

Because in written answers to questions from Senators, Tillerson backed off his public climate change presentation and descended into denialism heaven.

This is what he wrote, in answer to Maryland's Honorable Ben Cardin:

“I agree with the consensus view that combustion of fossil fuels is a
leading cause for increased concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere,”
he wrote to Cardin. “I understand these gases to be a factor in rising temperature,
but I do not believe the scientific consensus supports their characterization
as the ‘key’ factor."

First of all, why are they called "greenhouse gases", Rex? And if of increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases (which by their very identity are known to be responsible for maintaining the temperature of the planet's atmospheric layer) aren't the key factor in Earth's rising temperature, then what the f*ck (excuse me) is?

Well, let's put it this way. Tillerson gets it utterly wrong in the above answer. Not only is the consensus view that combustion of fossil fuels is the leading cause for the increasing concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere (that's not much of a stretch, given that burning fossil fuels produces CO2), but the consensus view is ALSO that this increase is the main cause of increasing global temperature. The scientific consensus STRONGLY supports this.

So what can we make of Rex's statement, then?

That's easy. It's a f*cking lie, by a f*cking asshole who wouldn't know science from a hole in the ground. And that's what he's good at, drilling holes in the ground. And lying to Congress. Guess we can expect a lot more of that, can't we?

Even though I've got several sonnets to publish here, I was busy last month and didn't get a chance to sort them out. So here's my first "release" for February. I hope to have a few more.

The wishes of the watchers

I found another's moment -- not my own,of course, but one I wish could have been mine;unbridled and exposed down to the bone --authentic, far beyond the safer linethat marks mere simulation. Time and placecould not be known, but they are lesser tothe import of the moment, flesh and laceentwined with strength and softness and a trueexpression of emotion's power and conviction. As I then anticipatefinality, I watch her hopes demandtheir expectations of his destined fate --and he complies with ecstasy's intentwhile I assess the marvel of consent.

Wednesday, February 1, 2017

One of the five women that I featured in this post was one that I knew very little about, other than the fact that her picture had a stupendous example of cleavage. Her name is Rachael Neiberding. Well, I found myself musing that in this social media era, she might be findable. And it turns out I was right. And even though she doesn't feature herself in bikinis very often on her Instagram account, she does provide the occasional swimsuit shot, and this demonstrates that her cleavage is still world-class.

"But the shallowness of Trump’s preferred form of communication indicates deeper things. His mind seems
perfectly suited to a medium that rewards impulsiveness, that ignores fact-checking and that encourages
incivility. Those are not generally the traits we hope for in a new president."

Well, as we are seeing daily, President Trump has a lot of traits we don't want in a new President. But we're stuck with him and those traits. In the scripted words of Denzel Washington, "God Help Us All."

Beacon Rock in Washington State is a volcanic neck, perhaps not as striking and unique as Devils Tower in Wyoming, but pretty much the same thing geologically, if not mineralogically. (Not sure what mineral/rock Beacon Rock is made of.) Beacon Rock is one of the striking landmarks on the Columbia Gorge

It's also right next to the road on one side of the Columbia River, and visible for long distances from the other side (though as I discovered, trees can block the view from much of the main road). I grabbed three separate views of Beacon Rock, shown below. I've been by there once, and it stands out.